REST (Representational State Transfer) is a style of architecture for building web services, where web services are built to be resource-oriented, stateless and lightweight. RESTful APIs are APIs (Application Programming Interfaces) that adhere to the REST architecture.
REST APIs use HTTP (Hypertext Transfer Protocol) as the underlying communication protocol, and typically support common HTTP methods such as GET, POST, PUT, and DELETE to create, read, update, and delete resources.
The resources that REST APIs operate on are represented by URIs (Uniform Resource Identifiers), and are typically in a structured data format such as JSON (JavaScript Object Notation) or XML (Extensible Markup Language).
REST APIs have become a popular way of building web services due to their simplicity, scalability, and flexibility. They can be used to build various types of applications, from simple mobile apps to complex enterprise systems.
A REST API (Representational State Transfer Application Programming Interface) is a type of web service that uses HTTP methods (such as GET, POST, PUT, DELETE) to interact with resources on a server.
REST APIs follow a set of principles that make them scalable, flexible, and easy to use. These principles include:
Client-Server architecture: The client and server are separated, so they can evolve independently.
Stateless: Each request from the client to the server must contain all the necessary information, as the server doesn't store any state about the client.
Cacheable: The client can cache responses to reduce the number of requests made to the server.
Layered system: The server can be a part of a hierarchy of servers, and the client doesn't need to know the details of the underlying architecture.
Uniform interface: All resources are identified by URIs, and the interaction with resources is done using a limited number of HTTP methods.
Developers can use REST APIs to build applications that can access and manipulate data from remote systems, such as a social media platform, a weather service, or a banking application. The use of RESTful APIs has become a standard for modern application development and allows for interoperability between different systems, programming languages, and platforms.